NEW YORK: Pakistan on Saturday submitted its right to reply in the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in response to Indian remarks on Prime Minister Imran Khan’s speech.
First Secretary of the Indian External Affairs Ministry Vidisha Maitra, while exercising her right to reply, had said, “Rarely has the General Assembly witnessed such misuse, rather abuse, of an opportunity to reflect. Words matter in diplomacy. Invocation of phrases such as ‘pogrom’, ‘bloodbath’, ‘racial superiority’, ‘pick up the gun’ and ‘fight to the end’ reflect a medieval mindset and not a 21st-century vision.”
In response, Zulqarnain Chheena, a diplomat of the Pakistani mission, said PM Imran had “exposed the real cruel face of Indian state terrorism before the world community”. Chheena said: “India is committing state terrorism in occupied Jammu and Kashmir for the last thirty years.”
He claimed the Indian government was carrying forward the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh’s (RSS) agenda. “The killers of Mahatma Gandhi are now ruining the secular face of India in occupied Kashmir,” he asserted.
Chheena further said Pakistan arrested Indian spy Kulbushan Jhadav who admitted to involvement in various incidents of terrorism inside Pakistan.
He added that the PM highlighted Indian atrocities in occupied Kashmir and on minorities in India.
Pakistan also called attention to the fact that India, despite touting claims that it had “removed an outdated and temporary provision” (Article 370 of its constitution), and proclaiming its “millenia-old heritage of diversity, pluralism and tolerance”, had failed to include even a cursory mention of the plight of the people of occupied Kashmir.
“The Indian representative deliberately did not mention the complete and cruel communications blackout in the occupied territory. Neither did she mention the plight of the innocent Kashmiris who have been forced to live for the last 53 days without essential food or supplies. 53 days without information about the well-being of family and friends. 53 days of total darkness and a biding fear of the unknown with no end in sight.
“We were instead treated to a fable that illegal Indian annexation of the occupied territory was meant to remove hindrances to the development of the occupied territory.”
Pakistan questioned such a “novel model” where the stakeholders to the so-called development are locked up.
“If indeed, the actions taken are so well-meaning to the people of Jammu and Kashmir, I ask the Indian representative: Why does the Indian state not allow the Kashmiri people to come out and express their feeling? Why is India so afraid?” asked the Pakistan representative.
“Does India have the moral courage to respond to the findings of the United Nations Office of the High Commission of Human Rights (UNOHCHR) reports on occupied Jammu and Kashmir that have documented a litany of barbaric Indian oppression in the occupied territory?” he further inquired.
“If not, the creaking Indian defense is nothing but a self-perpetuating farce.
“The central reality of all this, Mr President, is the dire human rights and humanitarian situation in occupied Jammu and Kashmir and the denial of the fundamental right of self determination pledged to Kashmiris by India, Pakistan and the international community as enshrined in the 11 Security Council resolutions,” he concluded.
